Phi Beta Murder (4 page)

“A pussy?”

“He never took chances.”

Rex lay back on the pillow. Nothing he had heard about Dixon Clark so far made him sound like a candidate for suicide. He had a family, a girlfriend. His position as a resident assistant kept him in contact with other students. He’d just returned from Spring Break with his parents in Nantucket. Rex had never visited New England, but recently he had read Nathaniel Philbrick’s
In the Heart of the Sea
about the true story that inspired
Moby Dick
and depicting the close-knit whaling community on the island in the 1800s. Dixon had a whole network of people to reach out to.

Presumably, his mother, grandmother, or sister had knitted the Easter bunny that he had placed by his bedside. A person with such strong family ties would leave a note, he was sure of it. And maybe one for his girlfriend.

Perhaps deeper forces were at work, something stronger than family and community. What was it that Campbell and Justin were not saying? There was a strange atmosphere in the dorm. He had felt it in the corridor, even before he had heard Kris Florek scream. Or was he just imagining it in the light of recent events?

No, he would trust his intuition. Something was going on and whatever it was, he didn’t want his son mixed up in it. He had to get to the bottom of Dixon Clark’s death for his own peace of mind.

Rex woke up early
in the stuffy dorm room. The corridor resonated with the banging of doors, putting him in mind of a cell block in a prison. Hoarse voices greeted each other as boys headed for the showers or out to breakfast. Campbell slept through the noise, sprawled over the rollaway, an arm and a foot grazing the rug. Rex got up and foraged in the small refrigerator for bottled water.

“Morning, Dad.”

“Morning. I was trying not to wake you.”

Yawning, Campbell pulled on some jeans. “Be right back.”

He left the room and returned five minutes later looking as though he had dunked his head under the faucet.

“Can we get breakfast in the cafeteria?” Rex asked.

“Not unless you want food poisoning. The eggs are green.”

“What about the ham?”

“Ha, ha.”

“What do you suggest, then?”

“I can get us some coffee and bagels from Einstein Bros. Do you need a razor? I have some disposables.”

“Ta.”

Rex turned on the television to CNN before going to freshen up in the boys’ bathroom while Campbell was out getting breakfast. His son returned with Justin. One by one, other boys gathered in the room, perching on whatever furniture was available or else sitting on the floor. Most wore sweats or board shorts and clasped cans of Red Bull energy drink. Rex sat on Campbell’s bed sipping his steaming hot coffee, a wrapped bagel beside him on the plaid quilt.

“How was the rollaway?” Justin asked.

“Great,” Campbell said. “Thanks for the loan.”

“No problem. It’s not often we have parents staying in the dorm.”

“Is there a rule against it?” Rex asked.

“Not sure,” answered a gangly redhead slumped against the wooden closet. “Parents usually stay in motels.”

“I have a motel room, but it was more convenient to stay here last night as I don’t have a rental car.”

The boys stared at him with good-natured interest. Rex got the impression they regarded him as though he were a rare and exotic species at the zoo. They were probably intrigued by his accent, which was more guttural than Campbell’s.

“Campbell said you were a lawyer,” ventured a bespectacled boy in a wrinkled Miami Dolphins jersey.

“A barrister,” Rex qualified. “Or as we call them in Scotland, an advocate. We make a distinction between advocates, who are trial lawyers, and those who mainly engage in legal matters outside of court or in the lower courts, whom we term solicitors.”

“Cool.”

“So what are you lads studying?”

“Engineering,” said the redhead, who introduced himself as Matt Simmons. “But everybody calls me Red.”

In Scotland, where redheads such as Rex were common, the nickname would not have been so appropriate. “And where do you hail from, Red?”

“Boulder, Colorado.”

“Must have been quite a change for you coming here.”

“I guess. I like rock climbing, but I enjoy water sports too. I came mainly because of the climate.”

“And what about you?” Rex asked a tow-headed boy.

“I’m from Indiana. Go Colts!” He pointed to his white thermal long-sleeve top with a blue horseshoe on the front, the significance of which Rex had totally missed, since he knew next to nothing about American football. “Business Studies, same as Justin,” the boy added. “I’m Mike.”

“Pleased to make your acquaintance. And what was Dixon Clark majoring in?”

“Public Relations.”

“Did anyone here take classes with him?”

The students shook their heads. None of them seemed truly despondent about Dixon Clark’s death, but then Rex didn’t know what their usual demeanor was like. Maybe they felt it wasn’t “cool” to display their emotions.

“I took Computer Science with him last year,” Campbell responded with a trace of reluctance.

“Who were Dixon’s close friends?”

The question met with a collection of shrugs and blank looks.

“He was in my fraternity,” Justin replied. “But Phi Beta Kappa is not a real active society, and we’re small. We mainly trade term papers and organize barbecues to raise funds for beer.”

“Klepto, his ex-roommie, I guess,” said the bookish one in the teal-on-white Dolphins jersey—or perhaps it was his glasses that made him look studious. “They were tight.”

“Klepto? Is that his real name?”

“Nuh,” Red replied. “His real name is Ty Clapham.”

“We call him Klepto ’cause he likes to lift stuff,” Mike from Indiana explained.

“He’s a kleptomaniac?”

“He takes iPods, digital cameras, watches, designer sunglasses, even rims off cars, and sells them on eBay.”

“Yeah, he’s got really light fingers,” Red elaborated. “He took my student I.D. one time. My fake one. Not that he looks anything like me. He probably sold it.”

Rex had the curious sensation that he was talking to a bunch of conmen.

“One time I couldn’t find my brand-new chemistry textbook,” the boy with glasses chimed in. “I paid over a hundred bucks for that puppy. Turns out he listed it online.”

“Did you make an official complaint?”

“We were going to once we got proof, but Dix persuaded us not to, saying Klepto had problems at home. We said okay, if he paid us back and agreed to move out of the dorm.”

“That was very magnanimous of you. Where does Klepto live now?”

“In the hood, back of the college,” Mike said.

“He’ll be at Dix’s memorial service, for sure,” Red added. “He owes that dude big time.”

“Yeah, Dix always had his back,” Justin agreed.

Rex glanced quizzically at Campbell.

“Looked out for him,” his son interpreted, picking up his books. “I have to get to class. Later, guys.”

Matt Simmons, AKA Red, groaned as he staggered up from the floor. “I got an assignment due in this morning. I better go start it.”

“Wanna work out?” Mike asked the chemistry student.

“Maybe later. I have to burn some CDs.”

They all trooped out, leaving Rex on the bed chewing on his bagel and wondering what had happened to discussions on existentialism. These kids seemed a bit adrift.

He decided to consume the rest of his breakfast outside and made for the quad between the dorms, where two trestle tables stood among a cluster of mature oak trees. He sat in the shade of one and watched gray squirrels dart up and down the gnarled trunks, twittering among themselves.

Students, singly and in pairs, headed toward the faculty buildings across the berm dividing the six-story brick residence halls from the rest of the campus. According to the prospectus, as Rex recalled, Hilliard University had been established in the fifties and had added a theater and new labs since then, yet remained a four-year institution of fewer than three thousand students.

A jeans-clad coed split off from a trio of girls and approached him. Rex recognized Dixon’s girlfriend Kris Florek from the previous evening. This morning, her profusion of auburn hair was confined in a ponytail. Her freckles, even more pronounced in bright daylight, matched the amber of her eyes.

“Hi,” she said. “Did you sleep over?”

“Aye. In my son’s room. How are you feeling?”

“Hard to say. I’m in shock, obviously. My academic advisor told me to take as much time as I needed, but I can’t afford to miss class. Anyway, it’s better to keep busy.”

“That’s probably true, if you can—though grief will catch up with you sooner or later.” He gestured for her to sit down.

She hesitated for a second before slinging her book bag onto the wooden table and settling on the bench opposite him. “Sounds like you speak from experience.”

“I lost my wife over five years ago.”

“How did you get over it?”

“Time got me over it.”

“I’ve known Dix for about five years. We attended the same schools on Nantucket, but didn’t start dating until college.” She caught her breath. “I don’t understand it. Why he did it, I mean.”

“Did he ever hint at doing something like this?”

“I’ve been thinking about that a lot and now I keep, like, reading things into statements he made, which I thought were innocent at the time.”

“Such as?”

She tugged on her T-shirt, giving a wistful sigh. “One time I was studying in his room. Well, dozing, really, on the futon. He was working on the computer. Suddenly he got mad and started cursing. He kicked over the chair and said, ‘I can’t take it anymore.’ I thought he’d received a really bad grade or something. He didn’t like his math professor and thought he had it in for him.”

“What’s the professor’s name?” He would ask Campbell if he knew him.

“Cormack.”

Rex swallowed the last of his coffee. “What happened then?”

“Dix was pretty stressed out. He went to the Student Health Center and got a prescription for Xanax, which seemed to calm him. I was worried he might become dependent on it. Also, there is a risk of suicide with anti-depressants, although I never thought he’d actually do anything.”

“Are you training in the medical field?”

“I’m at the School of Nursing here. I’ve barely been able to keep up, what with Dix’s problems these past months. The added pressure of him being an RA didn’t help. We decided to spend some time apart over Spring Break. I went to North Carolina with my roommate and he went home to Nantucket. His parents are flying in this afternoon.”

“You’ve spoken with them?”

“Yeah. They’re devastated, naturally. They wanted to know what happened. I told them I hadn’t seen Dix since before he left for Spring Break and that when I got back I went to his room and saw him, you know …” Kris wrung her plump hands. Suddenly, she glanced at her watch. “Shit, I have to go.”

“Take care, Kris.”

Nodding hopelessly, she got off the bench and wandered off in the direction of the teaching buildings. Rex wadded up the packaging from his breakfast and threw it into a concrete trash container, and then walked on to the campus library, planning to do some research while Campbell was in class. On the way there his mind worked feverishly.

Supposing Kris was right and Dixon Clark had become suicidal from taking the Xanax? Rex felt a pressing need to acquaint himself with the symptoms of depression in young people. How could he ever hope to help Campbell if he didn’t recognize the warning signs?

He had sensed undercurrents of tension from the boys in the room that morning and had realized to his consternation that he was completely out of touch with his son’s generation. One student was already dead, and he couldn’t help thinking that someone somewhere was responsible to some extent, though whether through ignorance, indifference, or even malice, he did not have a clue.

He could only pity the poor parents now on their way to the university, who no doubt were consumed by the same thoughts as he.